Impossible’ captures the terror of tsunami

Sunday

Jan 6, 2013 at 6:00 AM

Family Filmgoer

PG-13 — This dramatization of a true story tells a stunning tale of survival that could be too intense for many kids younger than high school age, despite the PG-13 rating. Engrossing and beautifully acted though it is, the film is not escapist fare. Its account of kids separated from parents during a natural disaster in a strange country could fuel anxiety and/or nightmares.

A vaguely British family, based in Japan for dad’s job, comes to Thailand for Christmas week at a seaside resort on the Indian Ocean. It is 2004. When the monster tsunami hits, Maria (Naomi Watts) is separated from husband, Henry (Ewan McGregor), and their three young sons. As the water recedes, she finds her eldest, Lucas (Tom Holland), and they start to slog through filthy flood waters.

Maria sustains a terrible leg injury (shown graphically once) and Lucas, not yet a teen, must help her to a hospital. They rescue a lost toddler along the way. As a doctor, Maria knows she could lose her leg or die from gangrene.

Henry and the two younger boys get separated in the chaos, but find one another again. The whole family reunites, as poor locals also struggle through the disaster.

THE BOTTOM LINE: The depiction of the tsunami looks very real and the devastation is stunning. Hospital scenes, with victims bandaged, suffering and dirty, are nightmarish and sometimes bloody, but not explicitly graphic. Maria becomes gravely ill. Children cry for parents, and parents frantically search for children. There is brief, nonsexual nudity.

“Not Fade Away” R — A talented but cocky and immature teen named Doug (John Magaro) has rock ’n’ roll ambitions in 1960s New Jersey, and a gift for infuriating his hardworking dad (James Gandolfini) and depressed mom (Molly Price, in curlers and a housecoat) with his loud music and new-minted political beliefs.

High-schoolers at least 16 and older — because of the film’s strong language, drug use and sexual content — who are into classic rock and 1960s culture will see “Not Fade Away” as a slice-of-life drama that feels truthful. They can watch as Doug and his friends form a garage band and get to be good, and then see what happens when not everyone in the group has the same hunger for success or willingness to work at it that Doug has.

Good music peppers the soundtrack, with songs by The Rolling Stones, The Beatles, The Kinks and others, sometimes sung by the real guys and sometimes covered by the teen rock wannabes. Writer/director David Chase, creator of “The Sopranos,” captures with bittersweet poignancy that ’60s feeling, especially the cultural and political friction between teens and parents in suburban America.

And he captures it without caricaturing it. But he loses track of his narrative in the unfocused third act.

THE BOTTOM LINE: Some characters use strong racial and homophobic slurs, including the N-word. Teen characters use strong profanity and graphic sexual slang. They also smoke pot, chain smoke cigarettes and drink. One sexual situation is quite graphic. Others are more understated make-out scenes, but still exude strong sexuality. An adult character is diagnosed with cancer, and another expresses suicidal thoughts. A teen girl is committed to psychiatric care by her parents and we see her carried off. The script includes some toilet humor.

“Promised Land” R — This earnest drama earns its R for occasional strong language, but otherwise, it is perfectly OK for high-schoolers 15 and older.

But fine acting aside, the movie may be just too fact-filled and serious to entertain teens unless they happen to be deeply committed environmentalists. If they are, they’ll be fully engaged by it. “Promised Land” has a mission, which is to get people to think about the natural gas drilling process called hydraulic fracturing or “fracking” and its dangers to the land.

Matt Damon (who co-wrote the screenplay with cast member John Krasinski) plays Steve Butler, a rising executive with a natural gas drilling company. He and work partner Sue Thomason (Frances McDormand) arrive in a rural community to persuade farmers and other landowners to sell drilling rights. Though he’s not above bribing a town official, Steve sees himself as a nice guy and believes in what he’s doing.

He and Sue are taken aback when they encounter resistance in the form of a science teacher (Hal Holbrook) and a slick out-of-town environmentalist (Krasinski). Predictably, Steve has epiphanies that turn his mind around.

THE BOTTOM LINE: The script includes fairly frequent strong profanity. Characters drink, sometimes to excess. A photo of a contaminated farm with dead cows in a pasture appears several times.

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